


The Wish

by misshoneywell



Category: Hunger Games (2012), Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Capitol!Peeta, Dark!Peeta, Disturbing Themes, F/M, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-22
Updated: 2012-12-22
Packaged: 2017-11-21 23:51:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/603428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misshoneywell/pseuds/misshoneywell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dreams really do come true.</p><p>But how?</p><p>AU. Dark!Peeta.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Wish

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bleedtoloveher](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bleedtoloveher/gifts).



She sees the boy in the wheelchair before he sees her.

 

The rally in front of the train station is just  _so_  very boring, and her daddy didn’t even notice when she snuck away to get a closer look at the shining, extra fancy train car that the important man from the Capitol had arrived in. She walks around the back of the caboose, and that is when she sees the blond haired boy.

 

He is struggling to reach down for something lying beside one of the silver encased wheels of his chair, the frustration on his face apparent when he cannot reach his goal. One of his legs kicks out in effort, while the other sits still and deadened in front of him.

 

She creeps up behind him on little cat feet, deftly plucking the weed from the ground and presenting it to him shyly.

 

“You want it?” she asks in her lilting nine year old voice, the puffy white thing cupped in her hands reverently.

 

“I could have gotten it myself,” the blond boy says snappishly, ten and wise beyond his years. His usual guard of Peacekeepers has abandoned him in the remote area behind the train, muttering words amongst themselves about things that he doesn’t quite understand, something that sounds an awful lot like  _restless mockingjays and angry natives_.

 

“Okay,” she says carefully, tugging on her dark braid.

 

They stare at each other. “I’m sorry,” the boy deflates slightly, his unnaturally blue eyes bitterly beautiful. “I-I’m not like this.”

 

“I am.”

 

“What? Mean?” the boy asks incredulously, wheeling closer to her in fascination.

 

“Yes. We must have traded places somehow,” she says thoughtfully, crouching down beside his chair.

 

He plays along. “It must be the magic in this place.” He glances around at the forest with his Capitol eyes, thinking that it looks every inch of a fairies playground, like one of the ancient books that his Grandfather gave to him in  _absolute secret_.

 

“Maybe,” she says seriously, running the dandelion along the boy’s arm before snatching it back, not understanding why she did that.

 

“Maybe it can heal my leg,” the boy looks down, his voice dropping to a low murmur. “Not even the Capitol magic could do that.”

 

She sucks her teeth for a moment. “I know!” the girl says, brightening. She leans forward and stares at him earnestly. “Let’s make a wish that it happens.”

 

He regards her for a moment before nodding sharply.

 

“Okay,” he says. “I’ll allow it.”

 

She claps her hands together in excitement. “We’ll blow on the dandelion, together, and because we’re both magic, in a magic place, it’ll have double the chance of coming true!” she exclaims.

 

He watches the enthusiasm transform her face, this strange girl, and a faint smile hovers on his pale lips. “Okay.”

 

“On the count of three,” she whispers, rocking forward in her crouched position in front of him. The forest is still. The sounds of the rally behind the train car are getting louder, people’s voices shrill and tight, but the boy and girl spare no thought to them. The forest, with its bright green leaves and fluttering winged creatures and toadstools, utterly rule them in this moment.

 

“One.”

 

He thinks that he has never seen a prettier girl.

 

“Two.”

 

She wonders if a boy from the Capitol really believes in forest magic.

 

“Three.”

 

They both hope that they will see each other again.

 

She holds the dandelion between their lips, and they blow together, their breaths mingling and creating a flurry of fluffy white spores between them.

 

“Now they’ll grow into a thousand more wishes, and one of them has to make  _our_  wish come true,” she says softly, leaning forward as if in a trance, her hands braced on the arms of the chair. He watches the girl come closer in fascination, his heart twisting in his chest. Her pink lips are coming nearer, suddenly brushing over his like a promise. And though he’s only ten, he thinks that he might…he might…

 

“ _Katniss_!” Her name is shouted by her father like a gunshot in the air.

 

They jump back from one another. Katniss scrambles up and is already moving away from the boy.

 

“You’re…Katniss?” the boy asks a bit desperately, her name sounding exotic on his lips. Her name already tastes like the best kind of memory.

 

“Yes,” she calls to him, walking backwards, her face wistful. “Everdeen.”

 

“I’m Peeta!” he calls back to her, wheeling forward, not wanting to lose her.

 

“I’ll be wishing for you, Peeta,” Katniss promises, staring at him intently before disappearing around the train.

 

 

* * *

 

 

“This is always the worst district,” his mother sniffs, rolling her eyes and gesturing for an Avox to come fill her glass with pale green liquid. “I’d just as soon skip it over completely.”

 

The blond boy rolls his eyes as well. He’s gotten very good at avoiding his mother over the years, and the sentiment is mostly returned. His perfect Capitolite mother has very little use for her crippled son. Viewing the Games together is about the only tradition that they have.

 

He ignores her bitter words and leans toward the screen. He scans the crowd intently, as he has done for the past three years, hoping to get a look at the girl who has haunted his every dream. It’s her first Reaping year, but he’s not concerned. He has some sway with the president, after all.

 

His grandfather denies him nothing.

 

“Vick Hawthorne!” the garish escort shouts cheerfully, and he sees the crowd part for a gangly, dark haired boy that resembles  _the girl_  so much that his heart starts beating at a staccato rhythm. He tells himself that this is common, that his research over the years about this area has shown that these traits are typical of a certain class of District Twelve residents.

 

“Madge Undersee!”  the escort calls out the second name.

 

“Well,” his mother turns to his father, pleased. “This is  _much_  more interesting. The mayor’s daughter? That’s fairly unheard of, even for this detestable area.” He hears his father murmur something back, an admonishment of some sort, but he’s so relieved that he just leans back in his plush chair. He wishes he could have had one glimpse of her, though. He’s already thinking about escaping back to the privacy of his own quarters when pandemonium erupts from the screen.

 

“I volunteer!” A shrieking comes from the screen. “I volunteer as tribute!”

 

His eyes pop open. This is new. This is new and that voice is making his heart hurt and  _no_. He watches as she takes the place of the crying mayor’s daughter, whose tear stained lips are forming a name that tastes like his memory.

 

_Katniss._

 

He sees her, and she is beautiful, and he is  _determined_.

 

 

* * *

 

 

She enters the grand hall, flanked by Effie Trinket, her beaming escort, effervescent and garish to the point of offensive. Effie is hard to hate; she’s so earnest in her joy at being recognized— for  _finally_  representing a winner.

 

On her other side is Haymitch, her soused, grumbling mentor who immediately marks a trail towards a table that supports a bubbling volcano of sparkling liquid. She tries to be thankful for Haymitch. She is grateful to him for her life, but he is like a can of Capitol rations—a vessel of fleeting, momentary nourishment, but utterly useless after the fact.

 

She is twelve, scared and stunned. The youngest Victor in history, they say. Her haunted grey eyes are wide and blinking rapidly at the beams of colored lights shooting her way as she makes tentative steps towards the middle of the room.

 

She smiles and nods at the feathered and jeweled adults that chatter and grin and smirk down at her in a never ending parade of shining teeth. She feels like a marionette doll that she had seen at the Hob once, just a stringed puppet that moves in tandem with Effie’s nods and gestures, encouraging her to interact and  _engage engage engage your sponsors that saved your life_!

 

She dutifully tries delicacy after delicacy that is offered to her; a round of beef wrapped in thick, salty cheese; an oyster shell stuffed with sweet, succulent meat of a crab; a spicy olive ripe with crumbling sausage; pearly beads of fish eggs lathered onto a crisp rectangle of toasted bread. The caviar – _yes,_   _that’s what it’s called_ \- makes her gag, but the toast makes her want to cry. It reminds her of home and sweet memories and she just feels so sick inside.

 

The food is delicious, and should be the best she’s ever eaten. But her stomach churns, and feels sicker still as the rich food tumbles in her arena-shrunken belly. She tries to smile as she feasts on the district foods representing the kids that died. The kids she killed. Kids like her. A kid that would be eating a hearty deer stew, popular in District Twelve, had that bow and arrow not appeared  in front of her at the last second like magic, allowing her to shoot the large boy from District One through the eye.

 

Her aim had never been so good.

 

Katniss gags again on her last bite of caviar toast, and the shimmering purple lady in front of her grimaces. Effie frowns down at her and she tries to smile back, a weak thing on her face.

 

She thinks that she cannot take anymore. The smiling, the devouring, the heavy eyes that won’t stop following her every move as she stumbles around the ballroom, greeting strangers. She wants her sister, she wants her mama, she wants—

 

“Hi,” comes a soft voice at her ear.

 

She jumps slightly at the warm breath, and turns, noticing that the circle of strange Capitol men and women surrounding her suddenly go silent.

 

She sucks in a breath.

 

The boy.

 

_Peeta._

 

She gapes at him. She can hear Effie scolding her, something about manners, but  _the boy_  was in front of her, standing, and she sees nothing but wide open forests and dandelions and a promise.

 

He holds his arms out and she collapses into them. The crowd around them disappears from her vision. All she sees is him.

 

“It worked,” she whispers.

 

“What worked?” His voice is calming, soothing, like a bedtime story.  

 

“Our wish,” she says into his neck. He smells like something spicy and warm.

 

“In a way,” his voice is a smile. He pulls back slightly, lifting the fine material of his pant leg up to reveal silver metal. “Good enough,” he adds with a laugh that might be a question.

 

“You’re perfect,” she says solemnly. His eyes widen as she places a hand on his cheek. He closes his eyes and leans into her before opening them again. They are just as blue as she remembers. And she does remember.

 

He grabs her hand and pulls her away gently through the crowds, toward a darkened corridor that is flanked by two Peacekeepers who nod silently at the boy as they pass by them.

 

“Is this a dream?” she asks him as they enter a golden elevator. She leans into him as the levels pass by. She hopes it isn’t a dream.

 

“No,” his voice is a foreign comfort as he smiles down at her, “this is real.”

 

“Where are we?” she asks hesitantly as they step off the elevator into one of the most opulent living rooms she has ever seen; it’s easily twice the size of the Training Center penthouse.

 

“My home,” he says simply, turning around. “I thought you would want to get away from all of…that,” he explains, fussing over her as he leads her to a plush, velvety couch. He sits her down, his hand lingering on her brand.

 

“But won’t we get in trouble?” she yawns, closing her eyes. She’s so tired. Maybe Effie won’t mind if she just takes a  _little_ nap.

 

He laughs warmly, and the sound envelopes her like a blanket.  “No, Katniss.”

 

“You’re different now,” she murmurs as he sits down next to her, her head dropping onto his shoulder as if it’s a magnet.

 

“It’s because of you,” he whispers, but she thinks she must be mistaken.

 

“This is a good dream.” She tries to stay awake, but she’s just so tired. She hasn’t slept since the arena, and this couch is so comfortable, and he’s so warm and nice and it’s her  _boy_ , it’s her  _wish_ -

 

“Go to sleep," he says, stroking her hair.

 

And she does.

 

 

* * *

 

 

She wakes with a start, her eyes flying open in panic, skin crawling. She can still hear the kids screaming; can hear the soft  _snick_  as an arrow slides into Cato’s eye, and the slick noise it makes like dying squirrels. Peeta is draped across her, sleeping hard; mouth parted, his soft lips pressed over so slightly against her collarbone.

 

She turns her head and almost screams.

 

“My grandson cares about you, little victor,“ President Snow says quietly from the dark. “The odds are in your favor.”

 

 _Is this a nightmare_? Another one?

 

She closes her eyes.

 

_No more nightmares._

 

She goes to sleep.

 

 

* * *

 

 

She doesn’t get in trouble.

 

When they wake up, Peeta explains to her who he is, for the first time. He tells her that his grandfather is President Snow, matter of fact and proudly anxious, as if informing her of the breakfast menu but not quite sure if she’ll like the flavors.

 

She is quiet before asking him what that means.

 

He says, “Nothing. And everything.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

It turns out he is right, because it changes nothing between them; how it feels for her to be around him.  She is able to spend her last few days in his Capitol home, his penthouse in the president’s mansion, rather than at the Training Center. She is allowed to forego the activities that normally befit a new Victor, a fact that does not go unnoticed by the old guard, the bitter winners from previous games.

 

But she is young, and oblivious, and cares only for home. District Twelve. And Peeta, a security blanket she latches onto with fierce desperation.

 

Effie and the prep team pop up intermittently to train and prepare her for her exit interview with Caesar Flickerman, Peeta watching protectively from the couch as Effie prompts her with potential questions. Katniss is grumpy and tired throughout the whole process, and he soothes her like they are the oldest of friends. And they are, in a way.

 

They’re napping on his plush bed that is the size of her entire living room back in Twelve when she suddenly turns to her side and levels him with her gaze.

 

“This is strange, isn’t it?”

 

“Hmm?” he hums sleepily.

 

“Us. We don’t know each other,” she says. He looks at her fully. “All that ties us together is a very old wish.”

 

“We know each other now,” he says, reaching out and twining their fingers together.

 

 _That_ had been his wish.

 

 

* * *

 

 

The Victory Tour is hell.

 

Every district offers a fresh new abyss, one speech after the other that must be stuttered out to stone-faced families of children who lived and died with her in that arena.

 

She sobs into her silken pillow at night. Nightmares plague her. Haymitch is kinder to her than he has ever been, and even the twinkle in Effie’s eye fades when she sees how wan and miserable Katniss looks every night.

 

Sometimes she hears them speaking in hushed whispers when they think she is asleep, and she wonders why they are in Haymitch’s room so late. When her name is mentioned through the thin train walls, she strains to listen, but the words are a thief in the night.

 

The only good thing, the  _only_  happiness she finds during the Tour, is the brief stop in the Capitol. There is a party at the president’s mansion, and dancing, and the never ending parade of food—

 

And there is Peeta, who holds court at her side and staves off the most persistent of revelers before whisking her back to his private quarters, where she collapses into a deep sleep.

 

No nightmares.

 

 

* * *

 

 

She is thirteen now, and the youngest mentor in Panem history. Haymitch tries to prepare her as much as he can for what is to come, in his own whiskey soaked way, but the fact remains that she is mostly alone and in way over her head when she steps off the platform and into the throngs of Capitol residents that await her arrival.

 

Her two district tributes, both older than her, give her dismal stares. The crowd calls her name,  _wild_  for Katniss, while ignoring them completely. It is a death sentence.

 

“Not even Finnick Odair garners a crowd like this,” Effie whispers in her ear conspiratorially. This makes her shiver.

 

Her name is being chanted over and over again, and she sees girls her age, and older, with black striped braids thrown over their shoulders. She’s in a sea of confusion and looks-a-likes and the crowd is pressing in on her and  _there he is._

She all but runs to him through the small clearing, feeling a thread of warmth and security for the first time since boarding the train to the Capitol. Maybe before then, too.

 

“Welcome back,” Peeta says, gripping her tightly. He looks older, and taller.

 

“It doesn’t feel good to be back,” she says honestly, missing the grimace that passes his face. He pulls back and takes her in.

 

“Look at you,” he says teasingly, grabbing her hand and leading her to a large, black automobile made of panes of thick glass and imposing metal, oblivious to the Peacekeepers that box them in protectively as they walk.

 

“You’re practically unrecognizable. Your letters and phone calls don’t do you justice.” She scowls as she looks down at her puffy pink dress and kitten heels, clothes practically forced on her. She thinks about her pants and simple shirt that Effie threw in the trash, and longs for them.

 

“You’re full of it,” she mutters, but squeezes his hand and follows his slightly uneven gait as he slides into the back of the car. They ride mostly in silence, Peeta sensing that she is not in the mood for chatter. He quietly points out a pretty park that they pass along the way, promising her that he will take her there soon, after she is settled in.

 

“Am I going home with you?” she asks hopefully, remembering how comforting, how peaceful it is there. He sighs and plays with her fingers.

 

This time, not even Peeta can get her out of her stay at the Training Center. As a mentor, she has to stay close to her tributes.  She learns the ropes from not only Haymitch, but the allies and mentors she finds in the form of Finnick Odair and Johanna Mason. They take her under their wing and do their best to explain how the system works. They’re good people, despite Finnick’s flirty winks and Johanna’s snappish ways, but still, she misses the blond boy. Her friend.

 

She doesn’t see Peeta much over the course of the next hectic week, the frantic days leading up to the Games. She tries to focus and learn and be as helpful as possible to her two tributes. It’s a good thing that she  _has_ to stay at the Training Center, she tells herself— that is, until her two tributes are flayed and gutted before even exiting the Cornucopia.

 

The other mentors are empathetic, and sincere in their apologies; only a few smirk behind their hands, like the hateful brother and sister pair, Cashmere and Gloss.

 

Finnick and Johanna do their best to calm her, but she’s in shock. Haymitch disappears before the canons even fire.

 

“I want, I think,” she stutters, pushing away Finnick’s hands numbly, “I think I want to see Peeta.”

 

Johanna and Finnick share a long glance.

 

“Katniss…” Finnick starts.

 

“I want Peeta,” she says again, her voice rising hysterically. She replays her gutted tributes in her mind, the images looping over and over again. She’s rocking back and forth and doesn’t know it.

 

A thin metal device is handed to her, and Johanna tensely explains that it’s a phone to be used for emergencies. With a shaking finger, she dials a long string of numbers that she has had memorized since last summer.

 

“Peeta,” she says. “I need you.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

He takes her to the park, to a place he calls a  _playground_ , and they swing back and forth on hanging chairs. She looks around with a numb sort of fascination at the brightly colored equipment, and he’s both charmed and saddened when he has to tell her what each of them are for. He demonstrates the swift drop of the cherry red slide, tumbling slightly when he reaches the bottom, but it’s worth it when she finally breaks into a slight smile. It’s the first one he has seen since picking her up from the Training Center.

 

He leads her to a swing set and pushes her back and forth for a while, her hands clenching warily around the chains that attach to the seat of her swing.

 

“Why?” she asks. She doesn’t understand the point of this place. She looks around the park and wonders how many squirrels live here. She squints and thinks it could look a little like her District Twelve forest, if not for Peeta’s guard of Peacekeepers in the distance, and this  _playground_.

 

“These are for playing,” he explains, finally sitting down in a bright purple swing next to hers.

 

“I wish there were dandelions,” she finally says, staring in the distance.

 

He takes her hand.

 

 

* * *

 

 

It’s more of the same the next year.

 

Her tributes do slightly better. They align themselves together, and last until nightfall, when a band of Careers stumble across them in a cave. They light them on fire. Katniss can almost taste the charred flesh in her mouth at night, the screams still echoing in her ears.

 

She’s technically allowed to go home, her and Haymitch, now that their tributes are gone, but she can’t seem to make herself leave Peeta’s bed. A car had picked her up the moment her tributes’ deaths had aired, and she hasn’t left his side since.

 

He frets over her as she lies in the dark. He smooths back her hair and hums. He rubs her arms. His patience runs out when she refuses to eat.

 

“Katniss,” he whispers, still mindful of her desire for the quiet, for silence. He respects the dark.

 

“Katniss, you have to eat.” He looks down at the bowl of hot, honeyed oats in his hand.

 

“Not hungry,” she mumbles into his pillow.

 

“You’re going to eat,” he says flatly.

 

“No.”

 

He grabs her shoulders, so strong for a fifteen year old boy, and flips her onto her back. She stares up at him.

 

“Open your mouth,” he says in a tone that brooks no arguments.

 

She does.

 

 

* * *

 

 

“Your friends don’t like me,” Peeta says, his fingers dragging through her hair lazily. “Is it because of Grandfather?”

 

“They worry about me,” she says, her eyes drowsy. “Finn and Johanna are like protective older siblings.”

 

“And Haymitch?” he asks ruefully. “He never passes up the chance to give me that  _look_.”

 

“They don’t even know you,” she finally responds, her head lolling in his lap. “You don’t ever come to the Training Center to visit me,” she points out, yawning. “Or the Observation Deck.”

 

“I can’t.”

 

“Why not?”

 

“Conflict of interest. I’m a member of the presidential family,” he says, his tone as soothing as his fingers. “I can’t spend time in the Victor’s quarters or behind the scenes, especially in the mentoring Observation Deck, because of my influence.”

 

She blinks up at him.

 

“What about me?” she asks.

 

“What about you?” he asks, scratching her scalp lightly, just the way she likes it. She visibly relaxes.

 

“I’m a Victor.” She stumbles over the word, even three years later. “You’re my best friend. I practically live here with you while I’m in the Capitol for the Games, or events.”

 

“You’re different.”

 

“How?” she presses.

 

“Katniss,” his voice is soft but unyielding, his fingers winding tightly in her hair. She flinches. “There isn’t a damn thing that would keep me from you.” His fingers relax and massage her scalp, soothing the little hurt there.

 

She’s quiet for a moment, considering. He continues, “Also, you come to  _me_ , to my home. That’s acceptable for a Victor.”

 

“Why?” She latches onto this.

 

His eyes shift away from her, and he’s quiet for a moment.

 

“House calls—it’s just something that some Victors do, as part of their continued service to Panem. Sort of the way you are required to attend certain parties, or business openings.”  She can tell he’s holding back, but she’s so tired, and his fingers feel so good.

 

“You say  _some_  Victors,” she yawns again, her eyes fluttering.

 

“Yes. Not you.”

 

Her last waking thought is of Johanna, and Finnick, and why they look at her so strangely at times. Or Cashmere and Gloss, whose looks are filled with thinly veiled contempt and something else. It’s because she’s different…and house calls…

 

She sleeps.

 

 

* * *

 

 

"Miss me?" she calls into the cavernous Capitol apartment, wobbling slightly as she walks. Strong arms wrap around her from behind.

 

"Every day," he smiles into the nape of her neck.   
  
"I tried to get away earlier but Johanna and Finnick had other plans," she says, leaning her head back against a broad shoulder. He sniffs her and raises an eyebrow. “They made me a drink from Haymitch’s stash,” she smiles sheepishly. “They said they were  _making up for missing my sixteenth birthday_ ,” she says, her tone implying quotations.

 

Peeta sighs. "Bad influences," he says, his lips flattening in surprise when she turns in his arms and peppers light kisses over his cheeks.

 

”You're silly when you're jealous," she says. "Don't you know you're my best Capitol friend?" she teases him with a slight smile.

 

“Capitol friend?” he asks, frowning. “Who’s your best friend?”

 

He watches her face carefully, seeing how it suddenly closes off. “No one,” she says casually. “You’re my best friend.”

 

He thinks about the surveillance photos that his grandfather has delivered to him every few days, partly to satisfy his craving for Katniss, and partly as a warning. Katniss is breaking critical laws. But worse than that, she’s breaking his heart.

 

He thinks about the tall, dark boy that so often stars in the photographs, the one who follows Katniss into the woods. Gale Hawthorne. He wonders what they’re doing in District Twelve, the Katniss he doesn’t know in the photos, in dirty pants and bulky jackets and a stubborn look on her face.

 

As they lie in his bed that night, Katniss snoring lightly on her back, her brow furrowed, he watches her face intently and thinks about how lonely, how  _cold_ , his bed is when she goes back to her home. He thinks that he can’t take much more of the back and forth between them.

 

He slowly reaches down past the waistband of his sleep pants and takes himself in hand— careful,  _so careful_  not to wake her. He watches her face and pretends that she loves him like he loves her. That she’s never leaving this bed. He lets the fantasy wash over him as he works himself over.

 

He reaches out his free hand and touches her skin gently, her light moan causing him to spasm into release. He tucks himself back into his pants and wipes his hand on a tissue from his nightstand.

 

He rolls close to Katniss and breathes her in, his eyes fluttering as he falls asleep, his mind still racing with final thoughts before the night claims him.

 

_He wants to keep Katniss safe._

_He wants to keep Katniss._

_How does he keep Katniss…_

 

 

* * *

 

  

“What’s wrong?” Peeta asks immediately, opening the door widely as she stomps past him, “and where have you been?” She throws her furred and feathered coat onto a chair and grumbles something back that may have been  _what_ or  _why._

 

“You’ve been in the city for quite a few hours, and you didn’t come here,” he pushes, running a hand through his hair.

 

“Yes, well, talk to Effie,” she snaps, flinging herself down into the sofa in his living room. “I had to immediately go to this opening for some ridiculous clothing store.”

 

He sits beside her and eases her feet into his lap, gently slips her shoes off and onto the floor. He listens intently as she complains about her day. He’s happy just to hear her talk, to hold her feet in his lap.

 

“I don’t even know why I’m  _here_ ,” she is saying, throwing an arm over her eyes as she leans back. “I was just here for the Games!” she finishes with a scowl.

 

It’s been four months since the last Hunger Games had ended, and he had made special arrangements that would conveniently bring Katniss back to the Capitol. He thought she would be  _happy_.

 

He pauses in his ministrations. “You didn’t want to see me?” he asks carefully, his voice laced with thinly veiled hurt.

 

Her face softens, and she sits up slightly. “No, I mean, yes. It’s not—it’s not  _that_. Just. It’s hard, Peeta.”

 

He looks at her.

 

“It’s not real,” she swallows. “All the lights, the food, the purging, the people— it’s like I’m whisked here in a dream, and I’m living out this  _act_ , and then I’m home. And sometimes, if it wasn’t for the nightmares, it would feel like it never happened at all. Sometimes that feels good, to forget.”

 

“I didn’t know that’s how you felt.” His movements are stiff as he stands up, and he teeters slightly on his false leg, a weakness she hasn’t seen in him in years. “That this is not real. That I’m  _not real_.”

 

“Peeta!” she protests, standing up with him.

 

“Good night,” he says tonelessly. “The guards will show you back to the Center.”

 

She stares up at him, baffled. “Peeta, not you. You’re—  _of course_  you’re real. You’re the only thing that makes sense here. You’re the only thing tethering me to the ground. I think I’d float away without you,” she says with jagged honesty, her grey eyes willing him to understand.

 

Still, he’s moving away towards his bedroom, and she easily darts in front of him. She’s a Victor, after all.

 

“Stop,” she says, her hand on his chest.

 

He looks everywhere but at her face.

 

“Don’t be mad at me,” she commands desperately, leaning her forehead on his shoulder. “You can’t.”

 

He sighs, bringing a hand up to rest on the back of her head. He relents and rests his forehead against hers.

 

 “The things I do for you,” he says. She pulls back.

 

“I want to go to bed,” she says, looking up at him through her lashes. Her eyes look ancient, not seventeen. He sucks in a breath.

 

They strip down to their underclothes and lie down, but it feels different. He holds her and she runs her hands up his back, but it’s not comforting. He’s hard, impossibly hard, but he doesn’t know what she wants from him. She throws her leg around his waist, and he’s painfully aware of his prosthetic leg, suddenly self-conscious.

 

“Katniss…”

 

She kisses him softly. He trembles. His hand finds her lace covered breast and palms it lightly.

 

She jerks away.

 

“Can we- can we just sleep?” she asks, a tear running from the corner of her eye. “I’m so tired, Peeta.” She lets her head fall back on the pillow, her face turned away.

 

“Okay,” he says painfully. “Okay.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

Her next tributes step off their plates early; it’s a coordinated move. They were sixteen, and in love, and blown into a thousand little pieces. So was Katniss’ sanity.

 

“I can’t stand this place,” she screams, flinging the fine china and cutlery off of the table, the fine food that Peeta had delivered to his room following their descent shortly after. “How do you stand it?”

 

He watches her, troubled. Poised to intervene.

 

“Murderers _, murderers_ , murderers!” she shouts suddenly, repeatedly, her face a mask of impotent rage and despair, her mouth moving against her own accord.

 

It’s his lips that stop the hysterical chant, his soft mouth working against hers and acting as a stopper for her treasonous words.

 

“You can’t say that here,” he says into her mouth, his hand sliding up the back of her head as she tries to pull away. “Katniss.”  _Kiss. “_ You can’t.” _Kiss._  “Not even here. Not anywhere,” he whispers against her lips.

 

She draws back, her eyes wide with surprise. She wipes her mouth, and opens it again. 

 

“Think of your sister,” he urges. “Your mother.”

 

She stops talking.

 

 

* * *

 

 

He’s flipping through channels as they lounge in his room, and she’s unusually silent. She’s had a strange look on her face since she’s arrived, one indecipherable to him.

 

“What do you want to watch?” he asks her, nudging her with his toe.

 

“I don’t care,” she says. “I can’t stay all night today.” She looks at him, troubled.

 

“Why not?” he raises his eyebrows. “Your tributes are…gone,” he finishes lamely. Sometimes he’s not as delicate as he should be about the Games, but for her, he tries.

 

“Here,” he pushes the control into her hand, like a gift she never asked for. “You choose. Now, where are you going tonight?”

 

“I don’t know,” she frowns. “Haymitch wouldn’t tell me much. I was told that I have an…engagement…” she falters as she stares at the large screen in front of them. She turns bright red, and then as pale as he’s ever seen her.

 

He looks up at the wall and sucks in a breath, looking at her quickly.

 

“Peeta. Peeta, that’s—that’s Enobaria and Brutus. What are they doing,  _what is this?”_ she shrieks, madly pressing the buttons on the controller. A title flashes across the screen,  _Victor Nights,_ before she finally presses the correct button to shut off the screen.

 

She pants, and he worries that she is hyperventilating.

 

“They were  _together_ ,” she stutters, her eyes wide and traumatized . “On television. Peeta.”

 

“It’s okay,” he says, reaching for her, but she steps backward.

 

“I didn’t know about this,” he says, his eyes pleading with her. “I swear it. There are films…” he trails off, flushing. “But I’ve never seen any Victors, I swear it!”

 

“Is this going to happen to me?” she asks shrilly, almost screaming.

 

“No,” he says forcefully, but something in his eyes makes her heart stop. “Katniss, I’d never let that happen to you.”

 

“Finnick. And Johanna,” she’s muttering now, pacing back and forth. “They’ve said things…hinted at things. But I never—“ she stops and looks at him. “I have an engagement tonight, Peeta. And Haymitch couldn’t look me in the eye,” her voice cracks and falters.

 

“No,” Peeta says, shaking his head. “My grandfather, he wouldn’t. Not to you.”

 

“It’s because of the things I said,” she whispers, and they both remember her shouted accusations. Her treasonous words that Peeta warned her against, tried to stop with his lips. It had happened a few times after that, too. Katniss would break down and Peeta would shush her the only way he knew how.

 

There’s a knock on his door, and they both stare at it.

 

“Sir,” comes the voice of a Peacekeeper, unusually apologetic. “Ms. Everdeen’s presence is required elsewhere.”

 

Katniss looks terrified, and Peeta is  _determined_.

 

 

* * *

 

 

She leaves with the Peacekeepers, tears sliding down her face, clinging to him until the very last second.

 

Peeta is immediately in motion.

 

“You know what has to happen,” his grandfather says calmly. “Ms. Everdeen is a wild card. She’s breaking too many laws, my boy. I’ve been very lenient with her, but this has to end.”

 

“I want her contract.”

 

He sighs. “Yes, but can you control her?”

 

“Get Haymitch Abernathy in here. I want her contract,” Peeta says.

 

The president makes the call.

 

 

* * *

 

 

She’s relieved at first, when she finds herself suddenly and promptly delivered back to Peeta’s quarters. She collapses into his arms, shaking, and thanks him repeatedly. It goes without saying that it was him who had helped her.

 

But then he begins explaining in hesitant words, about contracts, and the Capitol, and  _relocation_.

 

“Peeta,” she says, staring up at him. “I can’t  _live_ here. I can’t  _stay_  here.”

 

“You have to,” he says, his eyes downcast. “Katniss, there’s no other choice.”

 

“But, my family,” she says through numb lips.

  
“You can visit,” he says quietly. “And since a Capitol citizen bought your contract, your Victor funds will go to your family. It won’t be all bad, will it? Katniss? I’ll take care of you.”

 

She cries again.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Her things are sent from District Twelve. She cries for days, spending long periods of time on the phone talking to her sister, to her mother, and once even to her friend Gale. He tries not to eavesdrop on that conversation, but it’s hard.

 

“Tell Madge I said hello,” she chokes into the phone, “and…goodbye.”

 

He turns away quickly when her eyes find his, and they walk on eggshells around each other the rest of the afternoon. They can’t avoid each other once night falls.

 

“Why did you volunteer for the mayor’s daughter?” he whispers into her hair that night.

 

She tenses.

 

“She’s my friend. She—she was in love with Vick’s brother,” she finally whispers back. “Vick, he was the other tribute.” Her voices catches in her throat. “My best friend, Gale. That was his brother.”

 

He exhales into her neck.

 

“Madge and Gale. They were, they  _are,_ in love. The crazy kind, even when we were kids. And I couldn’t— I didn’t know what love was. It didn’t seem fair,” she struggles with her thoughts. “I didn’t understand that kind of love. I still don’t.”

 

“I do,” he says.

 

 

* * *

 

 

“I can’t do this anymore,” Katniss weeps, sliding down the wall of their kitchen. They moved a few months ago, into a sleek townhouse in the trendiest part of the Capitol. It was Peeta’s idea. He thought Katniss needed a change, a fresh start.

 

“They keep  _dying,”_ she sobs, staring at up at him with haunted eyes. “Peeta, make them stop dying.”

 

“Shhh,” he comforts her after climbing down to the floor with difficulty. “Next year, you won’t be doing this, Katniss.”

 

“How?” she asks, her fingers clutching at his shoulders. “How?”

 

 

* * *

 

 

He’s right.

 

District Twelve crowns their fourth winner in the history of Panem, a sixteen year old Merchant girl.

 

“I’m sorry,” Katniss says to Haymitch, handing over the mentoring badge and communication device that they are all given upon active duty. “I can’t— it’s too much,” she whispers, impulsively wrapping him in a tight embrace. Katniss has grown closer to him since moving to the Capitol; he’s a piece of home that she clings to. She will see less and less of him now, a price to pay for freedom away from all of this carnage and guilt and responsibility.

 

“It’s okay, sweetheart,” he says gruffly, patting her back. “I know.”

 

“It was so lucky,” Katniss says into his shirt. “Another girl Victor. I- I can hardly believe it.”

 

“Yeah,” he agrees, staring at Peeta over her head. “Real lucky.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

He thought things would get better, after Katniss retired from mentoring. And maybe it did, for a little while. She seems happier, more affectionate again. Sometimes they kiss at night, her hands boldly running over his stomach, him groaning into her lips. He tells himself that she wants this, that it isn’t because of the contract, and her fear of something  _worse_  than him rather than her desire for something  _more_  with him.

 

He’s twenty years old and he tries  _so_ hard to hold back with her. To not scare her with the depth and truth of his love. He knows that she is still so fragile, but yet he is still confident that she is getting stronger.

 

It’s when he finds her in the bathroom, her hand steadily dripping blood onto the gleaming tiles, when he knows things are not okay. They’re not getting better.

 

“I just wanted to feel something,” she says, her eyes wide with shock. He screams at her. He yells things he later regrets.

 

She retreats inside herself.

 

 

* * *

****

****

“Peeta,” she says.

 

“Hmm?” He is slow to waking, swimming to the surface of sleep. But always, her voice beckons.

 

“Remember when we were little?” she whispers, her head tucked under his chin. “Remember our wish?”

 

“Yes,” he says, confusion coating the word.

 

“I have another wish,” she says, her voice dreamy.

 

He’s afraid to ask.

****

 

* * *

 

“How do you stand it?” she cries, her olive skin waxen and stormy eyes hollow. Peeta has been dreading this conversation.  _She is going to demand to leave the Capitol_.  _She is going to break her contract. She is so miserable with me that she would rather break her contract than stay._

 

“How do you put up with me? I’m pathetic. It's all my fault.” She is wrecked, and vulnerable, and in desperate need of love. 

 

“No,” he shakes his head and approaches her as one would a wounded animal. “Katniss, I love you.”

 

“You're stuck with me!” Her voice shakes. It hurts him.

  
“Katniss.  _Katniss_! Please— let me show you how happy I am to be stuck with you,” he begs her, his blue eyes intense as he grasps her arms. “Allow me to love you.”

 

She lowers her head. She stares at the floor.

 

He kisses her temple, her cheeks, her eyes. She looks up at him through wet eyelashes, and nods.

 

She trembles as he leads her to their bedroom, lays her down and tenderly strips her of her clothing, placing little kisses down her face, her neck, the valley of her breasts. She sucks in a gasp when his tongue makes a careful swipe around her bellybutton before dragging down her abdomen to  _that place_. She jerks and pants and moans and grabs his hair as he devours her. She shatters on his tongue, and already he’s moving up her body. And then, he’s  _there_ , poised at her entrance, and he doesn’t need permission to join their bodies together.

  
  
He worships her body, rocking into her gently; so gently, that a pain so brief barely registered on her pillowy lips before being swallowed by his own questing mouth. Hot open mouth kisses and laving tongues and skin on skin and it was so intense--

  
  
“Peeta,” she says, clutching at him desperately. “Peeta.”  It is music to him.

  
  
“You first,” he promises. “You will always come first.”

  
  
“Have you done that before?“ she asks after, shy and pink cheeked and fully loved, nuzzling her face into his neck so sweetly that he felt his heart might burst from the joy of it. 

  
  
"No," he lies warmly, happily. "There is no one for me but you." 

  
  
And that is true. Katniss, his Katniss, the only person that exists in his universe. The other girls are nothing,  _were_  nothing, the ones he had delivered to his door in droves while Katniss was away in Twelve. Girls altered to have pert noses and dark hair and dusky skin. Braided brunettes with tight bodies that he never looked in the eye, always taking them from behind, their long, coiled snakes of hair wrapped around his wrist as he carelessly pumped into their bodies-- Katniss' name spilling off his lips as he came, always, always. 

 

And, when he was done with them, they were discarded. Those disgusting dolls, pale imitations of the one person in the world that he loves, were constant reminders of what he feared he would never obtain. He’s glad now that they were disposed of, dime a dozen that they were.

 

There can only be one Katniss.

 

 

* * *

 

 

He does everything he can to make her life in the Capitol easier. To make it a  _home_.

 

He offers her backrubs at night, her stretching and persistent grimaces a sure sign that her old Games injuries are flaring up again.

 

He strokes her hair when she cries at night, the time that she misses her family the most. He begins to understand that it’s not that he isn’t _enough_ ; it’s just that her heart can hold more than one person at a time.

 

Not like his. He only has room for Katniss.

 

He tells her that they will visit her family during the next Harvest Festival in her district, and she pulls him down on top of her. He’s left panting and satiated, rewarded for his news.

 

He takes her to the playground and pushes her on the swings when she misses the woods. He has an archery venue set up just for her, and when her eyes light up at the sight, he swears to himself that he’ll do  _anything,_ everything, to see that look on her face every day.

 

And in the spring, when their park is covered in dandelions for the first time, he knows that he has won. He knows that she finally  _loves_ him, like he loves her.

 

When she turns and kisses him, her tongue pushing insistently at the seam of his lips, he thinks  _finally, finally_.

 

 

* * *

 

 

His footsteps echo as he walks towards Grandfather’s office, one footfall heavier than the other. A merry whistle escapes his lips as he nods at a Peacekeeper armed at the doorway that he passes through.

 

“Peeta, my boy,” President Snow smiles up at him from his desk. “It’s been weeks since I’ve seen you,” he says in reproach.

 

“I’m sorry, Grandfather,” he apologizes with a smile, leaning over the desk and clasping the older man’s papery hand into his own. “I’ve just been busy.”

 

 “It’s fine. Sit down, sit down!” he waves him into the chair across from him. “I must say, your idea for Victor Films was quite the proposal. It has been a continued success on all fronts, I’ve gathered.”

 

“Thank you, I’ve heard,” Peeta says modestly. “Please commend Brutus and Enobaria for their stellar performances.”

 

“You should know we’ll be expanding upon your idea in the nearby future. Plutarch Heavensbee is head of the entertainment division, and he thinks Victor Films could put Panem in the position for a major coin flow from the luxury channels alone,” he says. “This is a very lucrative operation.”

 

Peeta shrugs. “As long as Katniss isn’t involved,” he says distastefully. “I don’t care about the others.” He pauses. “And obviously, my name and level of involvement need to be off record.”

 

President Snow smiles. “Of course. Though, of course you’ll be compensated for your idea. You are a silent producer,” he says.

 

Peeta smiles absently, looking out the window of the office.

 

The older man smiles knowingly and steeples his fingers. “How are things with Ms. Everdeen?”

 

“Well,” Peeta says, coloring slightly. “I hope to make her Mrs. Mellark-Snow in the near future.”

 

His grandfather nods approvingly. “Right on schedule.”

 

“There will be no…resistance on that front, will there?” Peeta asks delicately. “Katniss’ special treatment has been viewed badly in the past.”

 

“From the other Victors?” his grandfather shakes his head. “They will be no trouble at all, Peeta. No trouble at all.”

 

Peeta thinks of Cashmere and Gloss, an especially hateful brother and sister pair of Victors. Inside sources had told him that it was them who had generated most of the nasty commentary on his relationship with Katniss over the years, especially when her contract had been bought out so quickly, silently, and under the table.

 

“I have an idea for the next installment of Victor Films,” Peeta starts, smiling.

 

 

* * *

 

 

It’s the biggest event of the season. Everyone in the Capitol had been dying for an invitation to the wedding of the president’s only grandson and one of the most popular Victors in Panem history.

 

Haymitch watches as Johanna Mason tugs at her dress uncomfortably, and Finnick Odair smiles brightly, too brightly, at his Capitolite date seated next to him. Katniss spots him from across the room and glides over, all smiles and glowing skin and oblivion.

 

“Are you happy, sweetheart?” Haymitch slurs.

  
"Peeta makes me happy," she says with shining eyes, kissing him on the cheek with uncharacteristic sweetness before joining her waving husband by the wedding cake. He feeds her gentle nibbles of the decadent stuff, laughing good naturedly when she smashes her piece into his chin. Haymitch doesn’t miss the possessively splayed fingers of the groom cupping the stomach of the bride, marking where the tell-tale swell of new life would soon become apparent.

 

He empties his drink, and gestures for another. He is lifting it to his lips when he feels a gentle pressure on his hand.

 

“Let’s go home,” Effie says quietly, pulling him up by the hand.

 

They don’t look back.

 

 

* * *

 

  
“Where's Katniss? Haymitch asks gruffly, glancing around the mostly deserted platform. She is normally there to greet him when he arrives at the train depot from District Twelve, eager for any and all news of home.

  
  
“Home in bed,” he says cheerfully, shifting the squirming bundle in his arms. The Seam-skinned, Capitol-eyed baby perched in Peeta’s arms grins up at Haymitch gummily.

 

 "The pregnancy has been a little rough on her," he frowns slightly. "I think these two will be it for us, but they're the perfect number," he says, looking down at his daughter adoringly.

  
“It looks like you've gotten what you've wanted, Boy,” Haymitch says gruffly.

  
  
“It's Peeta, Mr. Abernathy,” he replies respectfully, as one does their elders even in the Capitol. “And Katniss is safe. Our children will never know the games. I think everyone got what they wanted. Even you, Mr. Abernathy.” He stares at him significantly. 

  
  
Haymitch thinks about Effie Trinket, released from confines of her Capitol contract, lying naked and delicious in his sheets back home.

  
  
"You'll be going after the president's seat soon enough, I imagine," he bites out.

  
  
"Oh, no. I'm more of a “words behind the sword” kind of man. That's not for me. At least, not for some time," Peeta says modestly. "Why, sometimes I think grandfather might serve for another 100 years!"

  
  
Haymitch shudders.

  
  
“Enough of this unpleasantness,” Peeta says gently. "Go to Uncle Haymitch, baby."

 

And so they walk to the sleek black vehicle together, one with a winsome step; the other was old, tired, and beaten, cuddling the baby of the 70th Annual Hunger Games victor in his arms, thinking perhaps he would give his old friend Plutarch Heavensbee a call after all.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the THG Holiday Fic Exchange. Prompt: Dark!Peeta.
> 
> Many thanks to absnow and silvercistern for their assistance with this story.
> 
> All mistakes are mine.


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